The OMB E-Gov Cyber unit will prioritize those agencies that have struggled to implement two-factor authentication for CyberStat reviews. Only 41 percent of federal civilian agencies are using HSPD-12 cards to log on to networks and computers.

The Homeland Security Department and the General Services Administration handed out the first of seven awards under the continuous diagnostics and mitigation program. DHS will implement tools and services to improve its cybersecurity under the CDM program. In his biweekly feature, "Inside the Reporter's Notebook," Jason Miller writes about this award and the next ones on tap. He joined producer Shefali Kapadia on the Federal Drive with Tom Temin to discuss the DHS awards and other happenings in the federal IT community.

Joe Paiva, the CIO at the International Trade Administration in the Commerce Department, said using a cloud encryption gateway helps protect data from the insider threat. Other agencies, such as ATF, focus on personnel security clearances to ensure their information is protected.

DHS officials tell Congress that while liability protections are key to encouraging companies to share cyber threat data with federal agencies, the department must also work to earn their trust. It must also work through a "policy puzzle" regarding roles and responsibilities surrounding information sharing.

Cyber challenges are more prevalent than ever. That's driving the need for more people with the professional skills necessary to prevent and mitigate attacks. To that end, the Army Reserve has launched a new partnership to build its network of cyber warriors. The program is designed to train soldiers in cyber warfare — for both the Reserve and private sector employers. Lt. Col. Scott Nelson is the Army Reserve's Cyber P3 Program Manager. He joined the Federal Drive with Tom Temin with more on how it all works.

The forthcoming Cyber Threat Intelligence Center would not only serve as a centralized hub for cyber intelligence, but also would fuse cyber information with other intelligence sources and serve as a central point for declassifying secret data about cyber threats.

The Veterans Affairs Department is requesting $20 million in fiscal 2016 to move its appeals processes from a mix of paper and electronic processes to only electronic. The additional funding is part of VA's $4.13 billion IT request to Congress.

In this week's Inside the DoD Reporter's Notebook, the Pentagon draws a clearer picture of sequestration for Congress and an update to an earlier DoD Reporter's Notebook item on the Pentagon embarking on a new review of the department's use of lowest-price
technically acceptable (LPTA) contract awards.

Andy Ozment, the assistant secretary of the Office of Cybersecurity and Communications within the National Protections and Programs Directorate (NPPD), said the continuous diagnostics and mitigation (CDM) and Einstein 3A programs would be "gravely" affected if Congress doesn't pass DHS funding bill by Feb. 28.

New research shows departments do not incorporate cybersecurity efforts into their goals and objectives, said Kevin Desouza, the associate dean for research at the college of public programs at Arizona State University and a non-resident senior fellow of Governance Studies at the Brookings Institution.

Information sharing is a two-way street with road hazards in both directions. President Barack Obama held the first White House Cybersecurity Summit last week and issued an Executive Order with hopes of fostering a more open exchange between government and the private sector. Jeff Schilling is the chief security officer for FireHost. He once directed the global Security Operations Center under U.S. Army Cyber Command and has seen the challenges from both sides. On the Federal Drive with Tom Temin, he pointed out cybersecurity was only one of the topics the glitterati actually discussed.

The Defense Department's National Information Assurance Partnership's (NIAP) protection profile will be the governmentwide standard for agencies to use when ensuring the security of mobile apps. The Mobile Technology Tiger Team recommended the NIAP approach because of the collaboration and coordination across government and with industry.

Maria Roat, former FedRAMP director and current CTO at Transportation, sat down with the Women of Washington radio show to discuss her work on FedRAMP and the challenges she faced in its implementation.

A handful of government websites are taking at least one step toward making themselves more secure. They're hardcoding a security protocol that would make it more difficult for outsiders to intercept a visitor's connection. That's according to 18F, the General Services Administration's tech team. Eric Mill, a technologist and member of the 18F team, joined Tom Temin on the Federal Drive to discuss the upgrade.

A task force assigned to take a holistic view of the Navy's cybersecurity posture catalogues security holes across the Navy enterprise, and concludes that plugging each one would cost an absurd amount of money.